Natural science
by chrysalis escapist
Summary: Science, it's his passion, what holds his world together ... or was that her? Mac/Stella
1. Kinetics and Potential

Natural Science

**Disclaimer: as per usual neither Mac nor Stella are mine, just the bad guy - though I wish it were the other way round.  
**

Kinetics and Potential

A body remains at rest or in motion with constant velocity as long as there is no outside force compelling it to change that state.

"Freeze!"

The criminal continues running, eluding them again. With humans it is a bit more complicated.

Mac frowns; annoyed by the fact that said criminal has repeatedly been able to escape them. Flitting about like an electron. Only a probability of where he'll be next, basically unpredictable. And seemingly an expert in using a human shield, having whipped a child into his arms he has left them powerless. If not a kill shot they'll have to make sure he's at least unconscious. The chance that otherwise he'll shoot the child in revenge is too big.

Another frown moves Mac's forehead into a series of parallel lines at a conclusion he has drawn. He's sure that Stella has hit the man earlier. A conclusion based on his knowing that Stella is an excellent shooter, and the fraction of a change he had seen in the man's movement: he must be wearing a bulletproof vest.

For how long have they been following him now? Time is relative. Not long enough because they still haven't got him. Too long because they have been reduced in number. All the way to an empty warehouse with barely a hiding place - except behind a child, his thoughts add bitterly - now there's only Stella and he left. They stand on opposite sides, pressing their backs against cold metal walls, only fragments of boxes for cover. Mac is not sure if it's good that they have the guy cornered.

Animals don't like that, they tend to lash out. It wouldn't be the first animalistic behavior the man has shown. Mac calculates chances as the man is prancing about. How far can he get in a moment of not looking, behind the next piece of possible protection? He knows Stella does the same; ready to signal when he can move, waiting for his signal. Drawing attention.

Bodies propelled into motion, alternately. Steps forward slowed by friction and gravity. Trajectories of bullets project in Mac's mind. Basically the same kinetics. A shot rings out. Sound waves, shockwaves, traveling through all material. Tearing the floor from underneath Mac's feet as he sees Stella fall.

Increasing his potential energy, mass times gravity times height. Potential, that what can be. But isn't. He can't run over, he couldn't have run over. Bullets travel faster than sound; she had been hit before he heard the shot. The moment he had seen her hit it was too late. Nothing travels faster than light. Nothing.

Though Mac's hopes and fears seem to. His soul reaches out for her. Sure, Stella was wearing a vest too. But those vests don't really cover enough of one's body. And the bullet could have penetrated. High velocity, high kinetic energy, tearing through material. Mac feels like it has penetrated him. Accelerating his heartbeat, he's trembling under its force, but he can't move.

Body: Stella. Outside force: bullet. Far too simple.

He can't convert the potential energy into kinetic energy. No energy is ever lost. _Please don't let her energy be lost._ It is always converted into something else. _Please don't let her be lost to me. _He's suspended in midair, impotent. Can only watch as the man, now having to worry about only one line of fire, casually walks over to Stella. The boy on his arm involuntarily protecting him from Mac.

Mac thinks he has seen Stella move. But it could also be that she was moved by the man, now standing over her, pointing his gun at her head.

Mac's thoughts are at a tug-of-war. He knows who he has to choose. He knows who he wants to choose. He knows that either way he'll never be able to forgive himself.

Another shot tears through the air.

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	2. Gravity and Attraction

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Gravity and Attraction

Sound wave. Shockwave. The sound wave is a shockwave. Causing an avalanche. A flood of thoughts.

And again he sees everything fall, people like grapes from a basket of fruit.

All falls down. People, stones, metal, glass; until only a cloud remains – a cloud that won't lift away from the city. Gravity. Eventually it all falls down; all, and every little particle of dust inside the cloud. His hand sinks down, his weapon in it. That one piece of lead too many still inside, pulling him towards the center of the earth. That one piece of lead he didn't have the chance to fire.

A black hole opens before him, again. A gigantic gathering of mass, a concentration of gravity swallowing even the light. Not really a hole. Though in theory the term makes sense again. A gravity so enormous it appears to punch a hole into the plane of its function._ What the hell am I thinking?_

Time dilates, stretches out into the emptiness before him, making room for the strangest thoughts. Making room only for thoughts; his movements condemned to slow-motion. And he wants to crawl into a hole, again. Just too much weight on him, too heavy darkness.

Claire, so much like Reed, and more like him than Stella. She had been swallowed when the towers had given in to gravity. She had disappeared into a vortex when the cloud had finally settled, that cloud that had seemed to weigh even souls down. She had almost taken him along.

It had taken someone like Stella, someone different, to pull him back. Like opposites attract she had brought him back from that hole. Little by little she had brought him back to life, had brought the light back to his life. And now?

He's still staring, standing still. Seeing a cloud where there is none. Seeing Claire where there is Stella. Stella the way he had seen Claire. Everything, fallen down, falling down. He blinks once, slowly, like in a dream. The man falls down.

Mac blinks again, is triggered into motion, an avalanche. _What happened? What the hell has just happened? _He runs, gravity tearing at him, Stella's presence drawing him closer. Faster and faster. Like she's attracting him, again.

Two bodies are attracted to each other by a force proportional to the product of their respective masses divided by their distance squared. The closer they get to each other the larger that force becomes.

Mac falls on his knees next to her. The man lying on the ground, one leg angled over Stella's body; the boy awkwardly sitting on the man's side, looking dazed. Too young to have understood, too young to understand what is happening. His gaze wanders from the man to Stella to Mac, and back again. And again, like a pendulum.

Time moving on; and Mac presses his hands on Stella's wound. No distance between them. No distance, a division by zero. Impossible, even for Stella. No, he corrects himself, a division by zero is not impossible, it's not defined. Like his feelings for her. Nothing is impossible for Stella.

He looks into her open eyes. Dull, the sparkle sinking away into their black depths. No, he won't let that happen. He won't let go of her. He will hold her back.

"Stella." Softly he attracts her attention. "It's okay. I don't know what happened, but it's okay. The boy is fine," he whispers, "and you'll be fine. You have the strength. You always have the strength."

She looks at him.

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Thank you for taking the time to read. I hope this chapter was okay. Please let me know what you think. All comments are appreciated, and all logged reviews replied to.


	3. Transmission and Interference

**Many thanks for the lovely reviews I got for this! Also thanks to **_**autumngold**_**, sorry I couldn't send a proper reply. And thanks to anyone who has this on favorite or alert, I'm so happy that some of you are enjoying this. Sorry this is so late, but you know what time is like …**

Transmission and Interference

"You always have the strength." Mac repeats in Greek.

He feels it making her smile inside. A shimmer makes it into her eyes, a minute twist of her lips visible. Fading equally fast.

He watches her every movement. Every blink of her eyes, willing them to open again. Every breath she takes, oxygen transported into her lungs, passed on into her blood. Rushing through her body heartbeat after heartbeat. Accelerated by adrenalin. Escaping through his fingers like time.

So much blood, why is there so much blood? Mac looks from Stella to the boy who is still sitting in shock, pale but obviously otherwise unharmed. Oddly calm, the boy's eyes are still moving from the man to Stella to Mac, a steady rhythm measuring time like a heartbeat. A heart still beating, allowing time to pass, driving it on.

What is time? How does it pass? Mac suddenly wonders, how do we sense it pass? Now, when everything seems to have come to a halt, seems to be holding its breath. And at the same time is speeding on, how does that work?

Mac's gaze flickers over the man who has stopped moving. That miracle of simple cells working together, forming a complex organism, come to an end. No more sparks of electricity telling a heart when to beat, telling an arm when and how to move, a hand to caress or pull a trigger. A forehead to frown, lips to smile. Sparks, in essence like any other, nevertheless creating a unique personality. A matter of seconds. Impulses transmitted, or not. Sparks somehow like those in Stella's eyes, transmitting a meaning, telling him of her pain and concern. But most of all telling him that she's still there.

How little it takes for things to go wrong. A spark disrupting the heart's rhythm. A spark in a brain forming the wrong idea. A spark in a gun …

How easy breathing seems to be, done without thinking. How hard it feels now. Mac feels he's breathing in resonance with Stella, feeling her body shudder under his hands with every breath taken, every heartbeat.

He wishes he could willingly transport warmth from his body to hers. It seems to take too long for it to pass naturally although he feels like the touch of her clammy skin is draining him.

Cold, dark, empty. Mac feels lost, a feeling he doesn't want to pass on. Still unsure of what has happened, what has happened to the man. Mac keeps his hold on Stella. Still warm, still his light, still filling every fiber of his heart. His thoughts hold on to her.

Two unique personalities, working together, making things work. Sometimes colliding, sometimes the perfect match. Two sets of brainwaves. Sometimes tending to cancel each other out, when they are out of phase and crest of one and trough of the other coincide. But usually they are in phase, troughs and crests line up, amplitudes add up. Combined forces._ We get so much done together._

And suddenly Mac feels that as different as they may have been when they first met, as different as they still are in many respects, they have also become alike, in their thoughts, in their emotions. Like two sets of waves in the end can become one, creating something new, something unique. Still exchanging, with every breath, every touch, every look.

It takes the ambulance eight minutes to arrive, not much, especially in New York. Eight minutes, the time it takes the sunlight to travel to earth. Not much later the team catches up. Mac is relieved to be able to transfer the scene to them. He feels like the trip to the hospital is done at the speed of light, incapable of seeing what passes by outside.

Incapable of seeing anything but Stella's eyes. Looking back at him.

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Many thanks for reading. I really hope this chapter was okay. Please let me know what you think. All comments are appreciated any time, and always replied to if logged.


	4. Everything is connected

**Many thanks for all the previous reviews, ****I really enjoyed getting them. Also thanks to all who have this on favorite or alert, and thanks to **_**autumngold **_**and **_**jerseydad **_**for the reviews, sorry I couldn't send a proper reply.**

Everything is connected

Her gaze steadfast on his eyes, her hand in his giving him something to hold on to, they arrive. Gently Mac keeps stroking her fingers, feeling the finest hint of a tremble in them. Her heartbeat.

He feels he can't let go of her, though he knows he must. And he will, as soon as the doctors and nurses tell him to. _But no sooner._

He doesn't know how much time has passed, but he becomes aware of a certain tension. He looks at the doctors who look at him. And at her. And him again. He looks at her, sees the IV line connected, all the machines. Like they are waiting.

Mac bends closer with half a smile, whispering, "Stella, it's okay to let go now. Don't fight the anesthetics, okay." He sees a sparkle in her eyes, the corner of her mouth lift. "I won't be far."

"Me neither." she whispers back.

Closing her eyes, and although he has expected it, wanted it, it feels like she's slipping from him. And he clings to her motionless hand for a moment longer.

Sitting and waiting, not far, but it feels too far. Mac looks down at his hands, still feels her touch. Quantum field theory. Strong force transmitted by gluons, gravitational force transmitted by gravitons … everything is connected. Strong force, he looks at his hands … _what transmits the force between us?_

_A force between us. There's something between us for sure._

Invisible. He doesn't see the room around him. Replaying what happened. Seeing Stella fall, and how that had made him feel. _We're connected, invisibly._

His cell rings. Phonons reaching his ear. Mac answers the call. Making a connection through thin air, electromagnetic fields. Hearing Sid's voice.

"Hey Mac, how are you doing?" the ME asks. After a moment of silence he adds, "I … didn't ask about Stella first because … well, I know that you wouldn't be okay if she wasn't … so …"

"It's okay, I understand." Mac says. A smile lighting his eyes. _Invisible connection? Looks like somehow it can be perceived. _"I'm fine. Stella is in surgery. It's quiet here, so that seems to be going well. But the bullet has hit her right below the vest; I wish those things would cover more of one's body."

"Hmm," Sid utters, "I kind of second that. Want to know how that guy died? Well, you were right about him wearing a vest; nevertheless he took a bullet to the heart. Entry wound in his crotch. Hawkes is checking the bullet, but I'm sure he'll confirm what I think, I don't see any other possibility. Stella shot the guy when he was standing over her."

It clicks in Mac's head. Synapses bridging, thoughts connecting. That was the other shot fired, that's why there was so much blood. _I knew Stella is an excellent shooter … and a fighter._

Sid continues, "She'll be fine. But call me when she comes out of surgery, okay?"

"Of course." Mac says, "Do …"

"The boy will be okay too." Sid interrupts Mac as if reading his thoughts, "He's with his parents, and they have a counselor at hand to speak to."

"Thanks." Mac ends the call.

He leans back, closing his eyes. She has saved him again. Saved him from having to choose between the boy and her. Saved him from having to face the consequences, the guilt of killing someone, even when that person was bad. Saved him even from losing her. Saved him, saving herself.

_Connected._

As soon as they let him he enters her room. Sits and waits, and thinks. A flow of thoughts, falling in phase with her breathing, the rhythm of her heartbeat. _In phase with her thoughts?_

Feeling connected.

Slowly she opens her eyes, her hand folding around his. She sees through his smile, her voice a whisper, "Why do you look so worried? The boy …"

He hastens to assure her that the boy is okay.

She studies him. "I'll be okay too. I wish I had had a choice, not to kill that man, but I think I didn't … so I won't let the guilt eat me, don't let it eat you."

Carefully she turns onto her side and moves back a little, patting the empty space before her with her free hand. "Now get some sleep."

He bends over her, their lips joining in a gentle kiss. Leaving behind a smile, sparkling eyes. Her hand still in his he lays down his head. Her arm on his back, feeling his breathing, his heartbeat. Falling asleep. Together.

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